What is a Bus Topology Network?

In bus topology, all nodes of the network are connected on the same wire/link. The wire may be a single piece of wire or divided into different smaller segments, connected together by devices like hubs/repeaters.

A sample Bus topology network is given in the diagram below:

As the name indicates a bus topology is analogous to travelling in a bus, where multiple members share the same bus space. It is also analogous to how different units of a computer like CPU, Memory, Input/Output Peripherals are connected via. a common address bus and a common data bus.

In a bus topology, since all nodes are connected on the same wire, collisions would occur if multiple stations transmit simultaneously. Therefore a collision resolution protocol is needed in bus topologies.

10 Mbps Ethernet is a classical example of a protocol using bus topology.